Valuing the ecosystem services of low-input, high-diversity prairie as a biofuel feedstock in southern Minnesota

Abstract

Biofuels may help to address the United States\u27 dependence on fossil fuels by providing a renewable fuel source (Hill 2006, Tilman 2009). The largest biofuel industry in the United States is currently corn-based ethanol, but the negative environmental and economic impacts of corn agriculture have prompted research into other feedstocks, such as low-input, high-diversity (LIHD) prairie (Tilman 2006). We argue that incorporating the ecosystem service value of LIHD prairie grown on marginal lands in Southern Minnesota would make it an economically competitive biofuel feedstock. Using a spatially explicit model (InVEST) we found that a targeted land-use change of corn to prairie on marginal lands produced a value of $198.89/ha in ecosystem services,$163.34 higher than an all-prairie scenario and $511.28 higher than an all-corn scenario. An economic analysis incorporating the value of ecosystem services found that prairie is only competitive with corn as a feedstock when the prices of carbon and prairie feedstock are high and the price of corn is low. However, improvements in modeling could better quantify prairie\u27s ecosystem service value, making it more competitive with corn. Our results demonstrate the importance of taking ecosystem service value into account when making decisions regarding biofuel policies